Don't hunters only kill one species at a time?

Yes. There are seasons for several different kinds of animals...though for birds I don't know if this is the case or not? For instance I know rabbits you can shoot whenever, so maybe some of the birds you see shot don't have a season either. But deer definitely have a season. Also in most states you can't shoot female deer.

However, this film was made in 1942. I have absolutely no idea what the hunting laws were like back then or if there even were many. You might not have needed a license back then at all.

Since it's a large group of men out hunting together, it might make a bit more sense that they shot a bit more willy-nilly, not much caring what they shot, just out having a good time.

You're right, generally there are specific hunting seasons for different animals, but...

The movie was based on a novel originally written and published in Austria
by Felix Salten, a Jew who later was forced to flee Nazi Germany after the
book was banned as a "political allegory on the treatment of Jews in Europe."
Original copies of the book were burned by the Nazis. The movie version was
released in 1942 during World War II. Maybe the idea of Austrian and German
hunters "shoot[ing] down everything that is there" was not seen as that unrealistic at the time.




I'm not crying, you fool, I'm laughing!

Hewwo.

The hunter(s) was a good ol' boy, and the gover'ment wasn't gonna tell him what to do, Christ Almighty!